Whether or not the voice keeps in prime condition to-day depends largely
upon the early training of the singer. If that training is a good one, a
sound one, a sensible one, the voice will, with regular practice, keep
in good condition for a remarkably long time. The trouble is that the
average student is too impatient in these days to take time for a
sufficient training. The voice at the outstart must be trained lightly
and carefully. There must not be the least strain. I believe that at the
beginning two lessons a week should be sufficient. The lessons should
not be longer than one-half an hour and the home practice should not
exceed at the start fifty minutes a day. Even then the practice should
be divided into two periods. The young singer should practice _mezza
voce_, which simply means nothing more or less than "half voice." Never
practice with full voice unless singing under the direction of a
well-schooled teacher with years of practical singing experience.
It is easy enough to shout. Some of the singers in modern opera seem to
employ a kind of megaphone method. They stand stock still on the stage
and bawl out the phrases as though they were announcing trains in a
railroad terminal. Such singers disappear in a few years. Their voices
seem torn to shreds. The reason is that they have not given sufficient
attention to _bel canto_ in their early training. They seem to forget
that voice must first of all be beautiful. _Bel canto_,--beautiful
singing,--not the singing of meaningless Italian phrases, as so many
insist, but the glorious _bel canto_ which Bach, Haydn and Mozart
demand,--a _bel canto_ that cultivates the musical taste, disciplines
the voice and trains the singer technically to do great things. Please
understand that I am not disparaging the good and beautiful in Italian
masterpieces. The musician will know what I mean. The singer can gain
little, however, from music that intellectually and vocally is better
suited to a parrot than a human being.
Some of the older singers made _bel canto_ such an art that people came
to hear them for their voices alone, and not for their intellectual or
emotional interpretations of a role. Perhaps you never heard Patti in
her prime. Ah! Patti--the wonderful Adelina with the glorious golden
voice. It was she who made me ambitious to study breathing until it
became an art. To hear her as she trippingly left the stage in Verdi's
_Traviata_ singing runs with ease and finish that other singers slur or
stumble over,--ah! that was an art!
[Illustration: musical notation: Ex. 1
il mio pen sier, il mio pen-sier___
il mio pen-sier.
]
Volumes have been written on breathing and volumes more could be
written. This is not the place to discuss the singer's great fundamental
need. Need I say more than that I practice deep breathing every day of
my life?